Sir Carleton Kemp Allen MC KC was an Australian-born professor and Warden of Rhodes House, University of Oxford. The third son of William Allen, a Congregational minister and the younger brother of Leslie Holdsworth Allen, he attended Newington College (1900–1906) and later the University of Sydney where he studied the classics and graduated with a BA in 1910. Having won a scholarship to Oxford, he attended New College and studied jurisprudence under Sir Paul Vinogradoff. He took first-class honours in 1912 and was elected Eldon Law Scholar in 1913.
During World War I Allen served as a captain in the 13th Battalion, Middlesex Regiment, and was awarded the Military Cross in 1918. After the war ended he returned to academic life, being elected Stowell Civil Law Fellow of University College, Oxford. He remained a fellow of that college until his death. In 1926, he spent a year as Tagore professor at the University of Calcutta and published his lectures from that time as Law in the Making in 1927. This compilation became an established classic and he completed a seventh edition in 1965. On his retirement in 1952 he was knighted.
Allen died at Oxford and was survived by his second wife, Hilda, whom he had married in 1962, and by a son and daughter of his first marriage. His portrait hangs in Rhodes House.
In addition to the works indexed within AustLit, Carleton Kemp Allen wrote several other books on law, one on politics and one on the Rhodes Scholarships. He edited Hermes (Sydney University) for two years. Allen is the son of William Allen and brother of L. H. Allen.
